Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR
- An Android Authority teardown has uncovered a Google Phone feature dubbed Ask to Hold.
- This could allow Google Assistant to hold your phone call.
Google offers a variety of calling features on Pixel phones, including Call Screening and Direct My Call. Another notable feature is Hold for Me, which allows Google Assistant to wait on a call when you’re put on hold. Now, it looks like the company could let you put callers on hold.
An APK teardown helps predict features that may arrive on a service in the future based on work-in-progress code. However, it is possible that such predicted features may not make it to a public release.
We dug into the latest Google Phone beta (version 141.0.662309765) and discovered evidence of a so-called “Ask to hold” feature. We weren’t able to enable the feature but the below strings give us an idea of what to expect.
Code
<string name="bam_center_fragment_bottom_row_label">You can answer when you're ready</string> <string name="bam_center_fragment_center_row_label">Holding the call for you</string> <string name="bam_feature_label">Ask to hold</string> <string name="bam_notification_content_text_label">Holding the call</string> <string name="bam_summary_fallback_empty_response">No caller response while holding</string>The strings indeed suggest that Google Assistant can put your desired calls on hold. “You can answer when you’re ready,” reads another string.
The Google Phone app already lets you put calls on hold by tapping the pause icon, complete with an audio alert informing the caller that they’ve been put on hold. So we’re guessing “Ask to hold” could somehow be a smarter take on this feature or a complete overhaul.
In any event, this feature isn’t available yet and there’s no guarantee it’ll see a commercial release. But we’re guessing it’ll come to the latest Pixels first if it sees the light of day.
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